Public Transportation
I’ve been pondering the idea of selling my car and relying solely on public tranport and my ever-growing collection of bicycles to get me where I need to be.
Why I should do it:
The savings would be staggering. My monthly expenses for my car are my loan payment $310, insurance $217, and Gas $50. Quarterly expenses include oil changes which I do myself but still cost $30 in materials, and occasionally I wash the thing which runs about $20 when I do it right. So over the course of a year I would save myself $7,124, or $593 a month! That’s like getting a 13% raise! Not to mention the whole ‘it’s cool to be green’ thing and using less gas.
Why it won’t work:
It’s fucking hot here! So riding my bike to the corner grocery store would entail sweating like a mother-fucker and when the outside air temp is 115, it’s closer to 140 on the pavement. When I returned from the grocery store I would promptly have to shower and do laundry. Plus, if I rode my bike to a social function, I’d be sweaty and disgusting the entire time. As far as public transport is concerned, it’s amazing how slow it is. When driving from my house to the airport (which is the primary function of my car and my job) it takes me about 15 minutes with traffic, it’s 7.6 miles away. To do this same stretch using CAT (Citizen’s Area Transit) takes an amazingly long 1 hour 35 minutes, which includes walking 2.4 miles often times while carrying 3 bags of luggage.
That just won’t work, for a 6 am flight, I need to be at the aiport no later than 4:45am, which means I would have to get on the bus 3:10am! That sucks balls! In the future, the city is planning on rolling out “ACE” Rapid Transit, which is similar to ABQ’s Rapid Ride. I have no idea what the ‘ACE’ acronym means, or when they plan on having it unveiled, but the proposed route they have only travels the strip to downtown, nowhere near my house or the airport.
If we only had a train system like DC or the Bay Area, but we don’t, so I’ll spend $7k this year instead. Unless there’s something I haven’t considered…
August 14th, 2008 at 4:34 pm
Word, I’ve also been thinking about this, as I think you know. I took the bus to work one day so far, but it was HARD. I have a lot of stuff that I need to take with me (both to and from) work most of the time, so I don’t know how it’s going to work out when I have all those papers and (especially!) during the coaching season.
However, I think that bus route is a little insane. It took me only an hour to cross the whole city, from my house to my work. Maybe you can look at other lines? Or is that the only option?
Another option that I’ve contemplated is getting a scooter. You could (theoretically - I don’t know how much you have in Savings) pay it off in one shot, there’s no insurance, and gas goes much farther. I’m still thinking about the cons - notably weather.
August 14th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Fo Shiz bro. Ive tried riding my bike to work but the heat is unbearable (and it hasn’t even been over one hundred this summer). Why dont you sell your car and buy a cheap car straight out, then insure it with liability. You don’t need a pimp car just to drive to the airport. You would still save mad money.
September 1st, 2008 at 11:29 pm
I feel you. It sucks that so much of America in the last 50 years has totally ignored public transportation. But check this out: http://www.zipcar.com. It’s a new-ish thing here in the bay and it rocks! It’s so much cheaper than owning a car and you can get one when you need one. I know it doesn’t help you in Vegas but just cross your fingers and hope that someday soon all of America will have some sort of car share program.